Entertainers stranded in Europe after the end of the war are trying to get home, and this voyage focuses on a group of teen performers (lead by the very peppy Marcy McGuire) and the rather aggressive reporter (Jack Haley) accompanying them as sort of a chaperone and obviously attempting to get a story. He squabbles with sophisticated singer Anne Jeffreys which obviously becomes romance (unbelievably) and gets into trouble with the law when they arrive in New York because of a misunderstanding from a telegram that puts praise on him for getting these kids home over the government. Had this film dealt more with the red tape of the chaos in returning Americans to the states over the not so believable romance of Haley and Jeffreys, it might have had a better flow to it and more of a purpose. Haley's character is presented as a buffoon, and rather an obnoxious one. Jeffreys is lovely of course, but there is no way I could see her character falling in love with Haley.
McGuire gets a few good musical numbers but at times is photographed rather oddly. Unlike fellow teen star of the early 40's, Judy Garland, she never found the right partner on screen for her huge talents, and thus lasted as long as looking as if she was in her teen years were believable. While many war musicals still hold up because of the great American songbook that accompanied it, this is ultimately a reminder of a time that most of us today can't understand because we've never gone through displacement or had to deal with a war that affected an entire world getting back to normal because of the millions of people transported to other places and not enough planes, trains, boats or automobiles to get them back to where they came from.
McGuire gets a few good musical numbers but at times is photographed rather oddly. Unlike fellow teen star of the early 40's, Judy Garland, she never found the right partner on screen for her huge talents, and thus lasted as long as looking as if she was in her teen years were believable. While many war musicals still hold up because of the great American songbook that accompanied it, this is ultimately a reminder of a time that most of us today can't understand because we've never gone through displacement or had to deal with a war that affected an entire world getting back to normal because of the millions of people transported to other places and not enough planes, trains, boats or automobiles to get them back to where they came from.